


overture to freedom

by pharaohleap



Category: Operation: Mindcrime (Album)
Genre: Mental Institutions, Mind Manipulation, Multi, One Shot Collection, Recreational Drug Use, Religious Imagery & Symbolism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-05-01 22:16:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14530395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pharaohleap/pseuds/pharaohleap
Summary: Everything before this moment means nothing: the moment he first hears the name "Doctor X".





	1. i can't remember yesterday ( nikki )

**Author's Note:**

> Years ago, one of my then-favorite fanfiction authors began a one hundred one-shot challenge and made an open invitation for any and all to join her in her efforts. Over the years since, I've gone back and forth with my participation, never being able to really commit to any singular fandom. Er, until Mindcrime came along. Mindcrime changes lives. Or just mine, anyway.
> 
> I don't plan to abide by the rules going out - namely those that list a word count minimum (that I'll probably overshoot most of the time anyway, but heck everything) or those that state they necessarily be done in order. This starting piece, in fact, is the second prompt, although I suppose I did technically WRITE them in order, just... am... posting them out... Hm. Either way, the important take away is that I'm using the prompts, though not necessarily abiding by rules or even aiming for the big one hundred. Heck, maybe if I hit one hundred, I'll keep going, assuming I ever hit that point. Wouldn't that be a ride.
> 
> The fics before you contain an unhealthy amount of headcanons, and are almost entirely self indulgent. Not all of them will focus on Nikki - and not all of them will be limited to characters contained within the rock opera itself, either. This is just a place to dump dumb stories, honestly, and if that's cool with you, that's cool with me, too. In honor Mindcrime's thirtieth anniversary, I present to you: Overture to Freedom!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompt - drowning, verse - implied canon
> 
> Memories leave him in pieces, and Nikki learns first hand what people mean when they warn "be careful what you wish for".

Nikki fought the day they put him away. Flailing arms and terrified screams had accompanied the group on their way out of the police station, strangers on each side of the hysteric as they escorted him to a place far from the original building, from the common folk – from everything he had ever known. It was no wonder why he was behaving in such a violent manner under that pretense. His hardly-bearable life had been stacked higher on a foundation of lies and hypocrisy, and when he lost everything, he lost more than what he had to begin with. To be ripped away from the last remains of a life he might have been able to put back together so suddenly, so carelessly was a nightmare he hadn't even known he'd been afraid of, and when the law's crude safe haven had disappeared into the distance as the white van pulled out and away, he didn't think twice about punching and kicking his presumed kidnappers with strength he should not have had.

They wrestled him through doors, into rooms; shoved needles into his skin to get him to calm and panicked when his terror overcame drugs meant to slow him down. Three times the normal dosage had been what it'd taken to finally get him to calm, but by the time he was no longer screaming profanities ( _screaming for a woman long dead_ ), he was all but passed out in the arms of his guards. Protests continued to fall from his mouth as they dragged him down even more halls, deeper into the heart of the seemingly-all-white structure, mantras of “don't take me”s and “I have to find her”s tumbling numbly past sluggish lips. If he had any strength left in him, he imagined, perhaps he would have been able to finally tear himself free and escape to the streets where he could continue searching for her. Continue searching for her until his heart caught up with his mind and accepted that she was never coming back.

A straight jacket was retrieved and put around him the moment they settled him down on something hardly more than a cot in the far corner of a tiny room. Through a haze of white, the depressants almost fully setting in and making it hard to properly think, he heard them telling him about how it was for his own protection, how this room would be his new home for a while if only for his own good. There were lab coats and guards everywhere – his absolute worst nightmares – and any hopes they had of consolation would soon turn to backfire on them. When he awoke, he would not be passive in the slightest, and the only thing keeping him from tearing the place apart at that very moment was a pair of metal cuffs and a cloud taking up space in his mind. Their talk faded into mutters under these thoughts, a chorus of mumbles that may or may not have been meant for him, and he learned it wise to tune them out rather than strain to hear talk he'd no interest in. In the moments that followed, his supposed “new room” was left empty, devoid of everything but a broken man chained to his bed frame.

No one understood. If they had even the _slightest_ understanding of what he had been through and what he had done, he would not be there; it didn't matter than he pulled the trigger of that gun on so many people, just that it _wasn't his fault_.

He remembered everything in those first days. The knowledge ate away at the inside of his mind, information he stored but couldn't share, and when insomnia held his hand at night, he sometimes thought to himself:

Maybe it would all be better if he could just forget.

 

* * *

 

He recognized the detectives' voices before they'd even stepped inside his room. To say he was at all pleased to have to look at them once more, especially when more than a little high on poison meant to keep him from hurting himself or anyone else, would be quite the lie, but when his snappy nurse was knocking on the wall and demanding he wake up, he had no choice but to do as told. The former hit-man pushed himself up from his laying position onto his forearms, regarding the two familiar faces through heavy lidded eyes and a look of annoyance. Of all the ways he could have spent his time wasting away in his room of white, having to talk to _them_ was not the choice he would have gone with by volition. The nurse departed then, door closing with her presence gone, and the party of four became a tense three.

“Do you remember us?”

Unfortunately, yes. Yes, he did. However, he also remembered the fiery temper the man on the right had, and afraid that any sort of remark like that would result in head collisions like in days long past, he didn't let that “unfortunately” slip. Afraid that a lack of any response would end in a similar way, he simply nodded his head. Eye contact had been made and acknowledgment given; not wanting to keep up a blinking contest of no rules with upholders of rubber laws, he let his elbows drop him back against his bed and drew shapes in the ceiling as the woman spoke up once more. “We know that last time you were... uncooperative,” she started, and the grave understatement would have been enough to make him laugh had he remembered how. Why were they even bothering? “But it's very important that you help us out here. There are a lot of people dead out there, and if you're as innocent as you say, you should want to help us clear your name and find the _real_ culprit. If you'll let us, then, we'd like to ask you some questions one more time. Is that alright with you?”

The words should have made sense. … No, wait. It wasn't that they _didn't_ make sense; he understood the logic, and if they had been under any other circumstances, he likely would have agreed with them. The problem was that – It was – His head shifted against the sheets toward her, and with a voice scratched with minimal use, he ventured, “... An' what if I say 'no'?” - it was that they'd never understand. No one would ever believe him. He hadn't the foggiest what the Doctor was beneath his alias and sea of lies, but from the way he spoke and held himself, the way he knew the inner workings of the mind and played the people like a harp spoke wonders of what he might have been outside the revolution. Namely the sort of man society would put on a pedestal. Respectable. Worthwhile. If the name “Doctor X” didn't have them laughing alone, any physical description he could give leading to a well-respected man would have him in more trouble than he was now. The word of a junkie always fell beneath that of... anyone else, really. There was no point in answering questions that would earn him nothing.

The other male in the room, though, didn't seem too pleased with this decision. “ _Look_ , big shot, we've got a dead nun, a lot of dead priests, and more dead politicians than I want to count on my fingers. Some of these cases have been going on for _months_. I don't know what crawled up your ass and died, but I can guarantee you that it's a lot less important than whatever it was that had these people killed. If you did it, _fine_. If you didn't, _fine_ – just tell us who _did_!”

One zebra. Three squares. Two hats. It was easier to focus on imaginary outlines in the cracks on the ceiling than on the things that tumbled from their mouths. He just wanted to forget. _Forget_. There wasn't a thing in his mind, in his words that could help them. His fingers pointed at dead ends, and the law knew money better than it did _justice_. And yet...

“... It was the Doctor.”

They flashed one another a look, screaming confusion silently to their partner before turning their gaze back to their crazed acquaintance in near synchronization. The woman spoke, her partner too busy looking positively incredulous to summon up words of his own. “You're saying your _doctor_ is the cause of all of this?”

“No,” he said. “No, no, no. The Doctor. _The_ Doctor. Doctor X. All his fault. Not mine – _his_.”

They didn't manage to get anything out of him after that. Suddenly, all the ex-hit-man's mouth was able to form was the name of his most hated enemy, a storm of accusations being tossed at the alias understood by no one but himself. Fifteen minutes of hysteria - “Who is Doctor X? Why did he do this? Where can we find him? Is he even _real_?” - came and went with no results. It wasn't until the two unwanted guests left that he finally managed to stop the torrent of words and steady his incredibly fast heartbeat. It wasn't until he remembered that he was, for once, unrestrained that he wondered why none of his actual doctors or nurses had arrived on the scene to subdue him themselves.

“Why” had been one of their questions. Why did X commit the murders, through another man's hands or no? Better yet: why had that other man let himself be used in the first place? There should have been answers, ones that he could think of even if his lips couldn't form the words, but there were. Each question mark brought along a blank space in his thoughts, the likes of which only brought about more question marks of another variety entirely. He should have know – _hadn't_ he known? Panic set in for a second time not an hour later when it dawned on him:

Nikki didn't remember anything from before the revolution.

 

* * *

 

“It's awfully quiet in here. Perhaps a little television would do you well?”

He never spoke to anyone at that point; never did much of anything on his own accord. The nurse who made her way across the room, heels clicking against hard floors as she went had been hopeful of some sort of recovery over the days he'd spent there. At least, this was how she had sounded. Her words were still drenched in a honey-sweet tone, her offer for a little television to keep the broken-minded male a little company spoken from the lips of someone who did not utterly despise her charge, but he could hear the facade slip more and more with each encounter. Each encounter he cared to pay attention to and was lucky enough to remember, that was. He imagined that the only reason why she was in hear at all and flipping on the grainy electronic was out of necessity rather than actually trying to keep him appeased. But that was alright. He'd never wanted her sympathy or her kindness, anyway.

“Do him well.” Laughable. She had known as much as he did that each second drove him closer to absolute insanity, and if daily sedatives and tired doctors did little to help mend his shattered psyche, what on Earth could trivial daytime television have done that would “do him well”? She left, though, shoes clattering to an off-beat rhythm down the halls outside his bittersweet haven; the sound itself was swallowed up by the poor acting of whatever soap opera she had chosen to leave it on. And what a channel to have him watch. Even the _news_ would have been more interesting than the fake lives of overpaid actors, and the whimpering of two young lovers about to be ripped apart from one another was most certainly _not_ the sort of entertainment he wanted. … Only he had to have been paying attention to the words filtering through the television a _bit_ , otherwise that last bit of knowledge wouldn't have stored itself away in his head.

Three “but I love you”s passed he and his empty room by before the former hit-man deigned to shift his head, heavy-lidded ocean eyes focused on the electronic across the room.

The scene that played before him comprised of two melodramatic young adults. At that point in time, the camera was trained on the clean-cut face of a raven-haired man. He seemed to boast quite a bit of wealth, his clothes about as far from rags as the blond was from a gentlemen, and if the aforementioned blond had to guess a role, he would figure this dashing male to be the romantic interest – or, at the very least, one of many – for the show's central female protagonist. The passionate speech of love conquering over trial and distance only helped to solidify that stereotype, as well as doing an even better job of making his audience-of-one sick to his stomach. Love conquered _nothing_ ; trial stomped it into the ground, and the distance between life and death crushed it into dust to be lost forever. He didn't want to hear about the roller coaster of a romantic relationship these two nameless characters had. Their success was as fake as his own.

But then _she_ appeared: the female main, teary-eyed and distraught.

 _Oh_.

Doctors and nurses would likely tell him that he was projecting, pasting the face of a love long lost on that of a character portraying a girl being ripped away from her own lover with a barely similar appearance, should he have ever spoken about this moment aloud. Deep down, despite his horrible lack of intelligence, he knew this, too. It didn't stop him, though, from twisting the facial structure _just a bit_. And then it wasn't Suzie or Candice or whatever silly name the writers had labeled her character by – it was Sister Mary Godfrey, green-eyed, blonde-haired, and horrifyingly alive inside a black box just a few yards away. If his mind weren't trapped under a thick fog, if his body wasn't bound to his bed by restraints, Nikki would have torn his way across the room to see her as up close and personal as he possibly could. It was ( _wasn't_ ) _her_ , and he had to be as close as he possibly could if only to make sure she didn't slip away into the void once more.

“It _just won't work_ , Devin. I have to go, and I can't do that if I'm tied down to... _us_.”

 Of course she was leaving. The mockery of his own love tragedy had to come full circle, and while this Mary-look-alike was unlikely to fall to the hands of death within the series' timeline, the departure was still reflective of his own's departure from life. It was with the feeling of something sinking in his stomach, in his chest that he realized that he didn't want to watch anymore. Fortune was spitting on him as always, and if he can help it, he was _not_ going to play into its hand.

“Don't you remember? The first time we met?”

The former assassin didn't catch the context of the question – more than a few sentences and arguments had been passed back and forth like a melodramatic game of hot potato while he mulled on the bitter irony of the whole situation – but where all else had fallen on his deaf ears, the split question makes its presence known in his conscious. Not-Mary answered with a moment's hesitation: a bitter yes and an even more bitter invitation for him to explain where he was going with such an idea. Such things, however, once again stopped processing in his mind, thoughts trained instead on the previous question and the implications of it. She remembered, evidently, and he, the actor, must have, himself – but did Nikki? Blue eyes locked on the porcelain face of an actor so much resembling a woman long past, a prompt he hoped to jog memories he was startled to find hazy, but the further he went back, the fewer those memories were. He could remember how she looked in death – horror in her eyes, bullet through her head – and he remembered the night in the church; he remembered the way she'd asked him to kill her and the candles they'd lit together. The feel of her hand in his. The way green eyes, soft as the grass after a summer rain could soothe him with just one glance.

But not what had led up to that point.

Why had they met? What had an anarchist revolution had to do with the catholic church? Perhaps he'd simply attended worship there? But no, that didn't make sense; he couldn't recall identifying with any Christian faith, or any faith at all, really. Maybe they'd... bumped into one another on the street? Throwing around options in his head, though, wasn't working. _Nothing_ was aiding in his plight to recall something that should have been so important. It was one thing to forget meeting someone met years prior, but he hadn't known her for more than six months, and beyond that still, it wasn't just memories of her that were missing. He couldn't even remember why he'd gotten involved with the revolution at all, when the candle lightings started, what he'd thought of the Doctor before that night... Absolutely nothing.

Nikki tore his eyes from the television screen, panic taking over his brain as his fingers grabbed for something so close, he could touch it, but too volatile to grasp in his fingertips. He was losing reality, he realized in horror.

He was losing everything.

 

* * *

 

“... Why am I here?”

There had been the familiar clatter of cleaning filling the monochrome room – objects meant to entertain a man doomed to spend an eternity within its walls clacking together as they're tossed as carelessly into a box as they had been on the floor earlier, the spray of disinfectant covering virtually every square inch of flat surface to do away with the mess he was known for leaving behind – for the better portion of ten minutes, but the question, spoken in a tired, underused voice was enough to have hands still. His nurse was never one for conversation, preferring to carry out her monotonous duty in relative silence and only spitting profanities his way when he was “out of earshot,” but the blond, himself, was even less so, not one to make much noise outside of the usual cough, sneeze, or grunt of pain at needles shoved through flesh. It would have done her well, irritable as she was, to pause at the sound of his rarely heard voice. Would have done her well to respond.

Something inside Nikki desperately _needed_ her to respond. He knew he was missing something, something that everyone else seemed to see that his sedated mind simply couldn't, and if anyone was bound to be able to shine a light through the cloud in his brain, it would be the one who saw him the most. Beyond that, to hear something from her that wasn't a disgusting insult would put his mind a bit more at ease; he knew he hated himself, and from the amount of familiarity the self-loathing brought, he probably had for some time, but it hurt just a little more to know that everyone else felt that way about him, too.

She didn't answer right away, body moving only to swipe up the last of his meager, borrowed belongings, but when the last blocks had been placed in her basket and the last pool of chemicals wiped fresh with a towel, eye contact ( _possibly for the first time_ ) was made. The golden curls of her hair, the red lipstick on her lips was so, so familiar -

Why was that?

“... Don't play that card with me,” she hissed, pristine face a stark contrast to words made of venom. “ _You know why_.”

She left then, arms full of things that were never his to begin with, and the biting words were as cryptic as they were scathing. All that the ex-hitman was left with was “his” bed, “his” clothes, “his” room – and that was it. He was supposed to know why he was there, was supposed to know what mental disease impaired him so much that he was unfit to stand next to the rest of society and why the doctors and the nurses and the other patients hated him so much. _He was supposed to know_.

Something pathetic, something bitter and twisted and fueled by a lifetime of pain he didn't even have anymore crawled up from the back of his throat, and even his pride could not deny what was happening.

He sobbed.

Because he _didn't_ know.

 


	2. yes, i have sinned ( mary, nikki )

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompt - father, verse - implied canon
> 
> The pivotal night in the church, seen through the lens of a woman who's seen this all before.

 

_01\. thank you, father, for bringing me to salvation._

  
  
She doesn't sleep at night.  
  
Rising high in the morning and busying herself throughout the remainder of the day may leave her fatigued when the horizon swallows the sun, the Seattle city skyline bleeding red before finally falling to inky darkness, but years of unintentional conditioning have made it impossible to fall asleep when all others do. She hides the bags under her eyes under layers and layers of makeup, drowns herself in a sea of caffeine that allows her to keep upright during her duties, and all for the fact that attempting sleep rewards her with empty hands – or horrible night terrors. Instead, she roams the church ( _the only safe haven she's ever known_ ) when the others rest their heads and pray their misery will vanish by morning.

Moonlight struggles to pool through stained glass windows, the mass hall lit mostly by the candles she lights on entrance and snuffs out on exit. Such low lighting, however, has never been foreign to her. If anything, it's become more of a comfort. It reminds her of this very place if she's anywhere else, and reminds her of _his_ poorly constructed apartment when she is not; here is where she finds forgiveness, but it is there that she finds real peace of mind.

Quixotic. It's been years, yes – perhaps three, perhaps four, though the blonde tries hard not to get caught up on the numbers – but the nun doesn't think she could spend the rest of her life here without the remnants of disbelief scratching at the back of her mind. From the gutter to the pews: not exactly how a young girl plans her life to go. It shows in everything she does, from her inability to recall the verses and her mismatching of disciples and saints. The crowds that gather here in the mornings may never know, and she may do well to cover up her ignorance in the presence of the other Sisters, but in her own mind, it's painfully obvious that she does little more than make a mockery of their art. The stutters, the tumbles, the way she tugs on the fabric of her dress when there are simply too many people ( _too many,_ too many _, all staring at_ her) in the room – they all burn themselves in the back of her mind, reminding her of the stark contrast between her air of perfection and a mind made of broken clockwork.

She's not the only one who knows, though. She can feel it in the way her priest looks at her, the blue of his eyes cutting through her flesh, her bone, straight through to the soul where there is nothing she can hide from him. She can feel it in the way he grabs for her latter – one mistake in prayer leaves bruises on her wrists in the morning.  
  
Mary doesn't sleep at night. ( _He'll wake her if she tries._ )  
  
Instead, she wanders his church, hiding in plain sight as fingers dust against the wooden curves of pew arms, cracking open tomes she would be wise to rehearse. Of course – out of the many things years spent on street corners have taught her – she is _anything_ but wise. Their songs and their stories mean little to her, anyway. She believes she knows where death will take her, punishment fit for a lifetime of dirty error, and no number of Hail Mary’s can spare her now.

No, no, she doesn't come here to read. She comes because it feels right, _safe_. There is nothing holy in the man that brought her here and nothing selfless in her reasons for taking his hand and letting her lead her away, but there are a few things to be grateful for in the change of scenery, and the fact that she can roam these quiet walkways at all in the most tired hours of the morning certainly takes its place as one of them.  
  
Before William, she had not stepped inside such a building since she was a girl, longer ago, even, than since she fled from home. If he hadn't offered her his stained salvation, the blonde doesn't imagine that she would have stepped inside one again.

 

_02\. thank you, father, for bringing me to the revolution._

  
  
She's heard stories of troubled souls slipping through the entrance and taking their seat before the cross in hopes of finding solace in God, but hundreds of nights of solitude in the very spot they would have claimed fail to prepare her for the agonizing sound of groaning hinges. The hours that proceeded this visit made it a necessary trip, an entire night spent with no one but herself and the geometric shapes moved to imitate the forms of countless biblical figures around the room. Mary needed this. _Needs_ this. Imagining Father William strolling down the lane is almost too much to bare, scraping at the limit that her fragile mind can take, and it's the worst she fears on turning to meet her newfound ( _unwanted_ ) company.

It isn't until their – no, _his_ , for it is certainly a male, and she can already feel her fingers tightening around modest fabric – clothing cries on the wooden floors that she realizes that the afternoon's sprinkles had evolved into a downpour. But the puddle alone is enough to make her doubt. Hard to envision him braving a storm to steal her away for his entertainment, and impossible to envision him braving the storm without an umbrella for protection at all. She squints for a moment, low lighting or no, but thinks better of it as a sopping mop of light hair peeks around the corner. Not the clean cut brown locks of the priest at all; she'd been cursing the thought of a guest before, but something swells in her chest at the familiar sight of her closest ( _only_ ) friend's face.

It also drowns out the uncharacteristically sheepish look that he wears, swept away in a tide of relief.

“What are you doing out in the rain?” the woman asks, and already, she's bouncing down the isle to meet him properly. Nikki. She can't say that she's disappointed ( _quite the opposite, really_ ), but she hasn't the slightest idea of what could have spurred this. He isn't the sort to appear at her church on a whim, his schedule packed too tight with all of the gruesome little things the Doctor forces him to do – and then she recalls an off handed comment from Father, something that would have warned her of this meeting had she remembered it sooner. Something about the hitman dropping in with something for the priest, which wouldn't have directly involved her, but she supposes he wouldn't miss out on an opportunity to see her, nor would she in the reverse.

It takes her too long to register that he's giving her the most peculiar look, and even then, she manages to misinterpret it. He must have expected her to be expecting him, she thinks, as is befitting of perfection. She didn't, but that doesn't stop her from making him think otherwise. Taking him by the hands ( _soft, warm fingers on calloused, icy palms_ ), she leads him further into the warmth of the Lord's house and further from the raging winds outside, saying, “I've been waiting for you. Come in!”  
  
He shuts the door behind him, the sound loud as it echoes against tall walls and higher ceilings despite his effort to keep the volume in control. Gauging how long he's been outside is difficult, but it seems to have been long enough for the raindrops to soak through his hair and his trench coat, both of which are attempting to create a body of water within the front entrance of the church.

 _Be useful_ , she scolds herself the moment he's completely inside, and she warns him that she's off to fetch him something to dry himself off with before she half skips, half walks away to do just that. As she moves, she thinks that this is just another of the small number of things she can thank her services to Father William for. Had any other servant of God found her first, disregarding the fact that they likely would have cast her out rather than letting her in, she wouldn't have even known that Operation: Mindcrime existed, much less have met and befriended its most dedicated worker. Toting around needles hadn't exactly been a thrilling idea at first, but it was a job that, like all others she'd been forced to do in the last three, perhaps four years, she quickly grew accustomed to. The blond man was like the church itself, empty of all its two-faced denizens; he provided for her the faintest feeling of safety, despite his very unsafe profession, and he was one solace she would have never found if she'd still be selling her soul away.  
  
Mary returns with towel in hand, no less than five minutes of her night spent retrieving for her guest something worth drying his sopping frame with. Despite her haste, she knows he'll poke fun at the wait, flashing her that crocked grin that would look broken on any other's face, but as become a sight she's well accustomed to. He'll laugh, and maybe she'll mirror his look before throwing the prize his way. Maybe she'll rattle the routine, throw it over his dripping face like any well mannered young woman would have turned her nose up to – but, almost as though he could read the moderately rebellious thoughts flitting through her head, she finds him standing just feet away from the entrance, exactly where she had left him minutes ago, and he doesn't look the slightest bit pleased. Memory calls upon the last time he'd been standing within the confines of the church some months ago, and more specifically on his tenancy to wander about in awe as a child stares at their first display of fireworks. The sequel may pale in comparison to the original, but it can't be so much of a disappointment as to give him the look of a man half dead on his feet. He's not catching her eye, either, and before the inevitable wave of self scolding for not realizing this ailment sooner crashes into her with a vengeance, she takes a step closer and dares to call his name. “... Nikki?”

He doesn't say anything, but it doesn't take long for her to realize that he has no need to. Her eye catches sight of something that shouldn't be there, lighting, dull as it may be, raining on something grasped in his hands, and what had looked like just another spot on his coat suffering the worst from the rainstorm outside suddenly reveals its true nature.

Funny how a single step was all she needed to take to recognize the splatter of blood on his coat, surprisingly untouched by the pouring rain outside. ( _She doesn't bother to ask herself if it's still clinging to him because it's fresh._ )

She can't possibly understand the finer details of what's going on inside his mind, but knowing him, she can hazard a guess; his latest hit must have gone horribly wrong to have him as frazzled as he looks, and already she's calling upon the proper words to console him with. She'll talk him down, they'll light his candles, and all will be well by morning. At least, she hopes that is how things will end. The words haven't the chance to leave her tongue, though, before he's opening his mouth, lips forming syllables and vocal chords producing noise loud enough to recognize are there, but near impossible to hear through the fabric of her headpiece.

“What was that?” the blonde prompts, but even then, it's only the fact that she's straining to hear him and not that he speaks any louder that she finally understands.

“He's dead.” A pause – a shuddering breath. “I killed him, Mary.”

Silence hangs over them horribly for a moment, punctuated by a muted crash of thunder in the distance, and it takes her longer than she'd like to admit to realize that he's not going to elaborate any further. Who was his latest victim? Usually, she can't find it in herself to care, but _usually_ , her friend is not left like this in the wake of the murder. She briefly wonders if ( _hopes that_ ) it is the Doctor – but quickly casts the thought aside, realizing it to be impossible. This, frightening as it is becoming still seems mild in comparison to how she envisions him acting in the event that he accidentally dealt his employer a fatal blow; the guess, though, is not without its uses, and between it and the realization that blood could only last so long in the rain puts a very different face in her mind. Oh. _Oh_.

Mary spins on her heel, green eyes locking themselves on the statue of Jesus hanging upon his cross yards above the priest's cursed altar. The _dead_ priest. Gone forever, off to visit Heaven's gates. ( _Or not_.)

The thought does loops through her mind, bouncing off walls and echoing back at her louder than before, and she can _picture_ it: barrel pressed against flesh and William falling down, down, down. And she _smiles_. To grin at another's demise can only attest to how fiendish of a monster she really is, but the news brings with it jubilation so strong that its impossible to force down the upturn of her lips, and she can't face Nikki like this, bright-eyed and elated over the loss of one of God's meticulous workers. She _won't_ face him. He thinks so much of her, and to know that she is a demon who smiles at the murder of the man who saved her life would be to tear it all down.

She needs – she needs a distraction. Something to tear her mind away from this, at least long enough to feign sorrow for his passing, or at the very least indifference. She asks him without really minding the answer, “So why are you _here_?” Truly, it was dangerous here, so close to the scene of the crime. It isn't to say that she doubts his ability to get away ( _one of many reasons the question lacks conviction_ ), but she can't imagine that he'd risked getting caught just to tell her that he was a dead man. That was something that could be discovered with just as much horror ( _joy_ ) come the morning.

Curiosity in its entirety doesn't start to set in until she realizes that he hasn't spoken a word of response, quiet or otherwise, in more than a few minute's time. This time, though, she doesn't have to egg him on to hear him speak. ( _When he's done, she almost wishes she would have._ )

“I’m here to kill _you_.”

The air in the hall seems to freeze around them, a sudden chill breathing down the back of her neck despite the monochrome fabric of her habit covering near every inch of skin on her body. She, too, finds herself trapped in place, immovable like the static limbs of a beautifully crafted ice sculpture, and she does not imagine she could turn to face him even if she so desired. A trembling index finger tapping against the trigger of a gun is louder than the sound of light rain pattering against the primary colors of the church’s stained glass windows, louder than the distant roll of thunder that seems to be swallowed entirely by this shocking new revelation.

She knows that if she turns, there he will be with gun in hand and remorse in his eyes - because they are friends, such good friends, but his love for her simply cannot compare to his adoration of the Doctor, and if he has placed the bounty on her head, it is only a matter of time before he sees her dead. It’s… _funny_ , almost, imagining that the one she had long thought she’d be willing to take a bullet for is suddenly the one with his hands wrapped about the hilt. Funny, but, in hindsight, to be expected. Why is it that she even allowed herself to be surprised at all? Father William is already dead - thank the Lord - but the killer wouldn’t have come to visit her solely to tell her the news. The only _reasonable_ explanation for his presence on this night is that she, too, must be done away with. Tonight is the night she dies.

“X said - he said that you both knew too much,” Nikki tries to explain, ocean hues clawing at the back of her head and making it harder to turn and face him. Words strung together to reassure her that this is not out of spite or out of desire, but necessity; still, she can’t help but think that the tremble in his tone gives away that he’s attempting to convince himself as much about the importance of this murder as she. For a moment, Mary wonders if he will be able to fire at all, but kills the thought almost as soon as it arrives. She’s always been second best, and now is not the time to hope for a stroke of magnificent luck. “It’s dangerous if you’re around. You might tell someone, or the police might find you first and hurt you, and - and it’s better this way, I promise. I won’t let it hurt.”

The idea that law enforcement would arrive and harass her into some sort of confession against the revolution seems laughable, regardless of whether or not she would be seen as the only person on site during the time of the priest’s recent murder, but it’s a thought that’s so characteristic of her friend that she can’t even find it in herself to correct him. A painless death, too, is just so _him_ , and for a fleeting second, she wonders if maybe this would be a fine way to leave.

One fleeting second, however, becomes another - and soon, they’re not fleeting at all. What does she have on this miserable planet? Nothing - _nothing_. The man before her has been the only person who gave her so much as a second thought and was perhaps the only positive thing in her life. With so little left to live for, how could she tear him from his responsibility? And - and if it is him that she sees last, maybe this isn’t just a fine way to leave. Maybe it’s the best.

He’s been talking this entire time, more rationalizations of a situation that he can only see as grim, but where the words had been falling on deaf ears up until that point, she quickly catches the way his tone falters and tries to recover when she finally twists on her heel and meets his eye. Shock horror dances in the blues of his eye, nearly identical to how she’d pictured it in her mind just moments before, and it becomes even more of a struggle to regain his trembling moment as she takes a series of uneven steps to close the long distance between them. Pews disappear from her periphery as his tongue finally stills, and she stops only an arm’s length away from him.

 _Think of him_ , she tells herself. _This is for him_.

“Do it,” Mary says with a conviction she does not really possess. “Kill me.”

The words were meant to help him, to remove all doubt from the situation and allow him to do what he’d ultimately have to without any shred of guilt. He’s supposed to kill her, and she wants to die. It should be so simple - so _terribly_ simple - but Nikki’s whole body seems to jerk at the words, and instead of doing as ordered by not one, but now two people, he stares at her with eyes impossibly wide. She wishes she could make him move, do _anything_ , but the hall lapses into deafening silence for much too long a time.

It seems a miracle when he finally opens his mouth to speak, but they’re not quite the words she wants to hear. “Mary, you… You… _What_?”

 _You idiot_ , the nun thinks, but quickly reprimands herself for it. Her friend has never been the most intelligent of men, but she’s no genius herself, and she supposes that she’d be taken aback to learn that he was ready to face his death in the reverse situation. ( _Hasn’t the writing been on the wall, though, the entire time?_ ) Still, she can’t deny that he’s making this harder than it should be, and if he’s going to choose his precious little employer over her, he should at least have the decency to not draw the betrayal out.

“Kill me,” she repeats, louder, eyes latching onto the pistol in his trembling hand and taking it into her own. Numbly, he follows the movement, and in moments, she has the barrel pressed against her forehead, cold metal fighting the thunder of her blood beneath warm skin. “I’ll close my eyes, and you shoot.” A pause; he still hasn’t moved, and she’s growing desperate. “ _Please_ , Nikki,” Mary whispers, eyelids fluttering shut and grip tightening around his pale fingers and the handle they curl around. “It’ll be easier this way.”

 

_03\. thank you, father, for bringing me to him._

 

There is a crash, louder than that of the thunder screaming from a thousand miles away and quieter than the pulse beating against the further reaches of her brain, and for one starling moment, she's straightened entirely, unsure of where the bullet has struck, why she cannot feel where it has entered.

… Why the gun in on the floor, no visible smoke trailing off of its deadly nozzle the way it should be. No blood dripping down her habit the _way it should be_.

He'll never listen – he never has, he never will – and anger reigns supreme in the place of tentative peace at the realization that he's, as literally as figuratively, thrown away his chance to complete his mission and put her to proper rest. Screams build in the back of the woman's throat, clawing their way upward and into her mouth and prepping to explode passed her lipstick stained mouth only for the noise to catch behind her teeth, crumpling at the feeling of thin arms enveloping her and a face pressed hard into the crook of her neck. _His_ arms. _His_ face. One hundred images of embraces shared before flash through a startled mind, and each one is spurred from an emotion much different than this. He begins to sob dryly into her shoulder, heaving shoulders without tears running down his disproportionate face and into the black fabric of her clothes, and she sets aside her dwindling rage long enough to hold him ( _limply_ ) back.

He whispers, “Don't say that.” Mary can feel the words more than she hears them and loses herself in the rumble of his voice through her shoulder when he repeats it again and again, thinking, perhaps, that if only he can say it enough times, it will banish the thought from her mind. What a fool; how long will it take before he realizes that he only ever hears what he wants to hear?

But she's just the same: a fool, an utter _fool_ who can't open her ears beyond what's most favorable to her.

Selective hearing, however, fails her now.

“... I love you.”

Breathing fails her then, too, oxygen cutting itself short just an inch from her lungs, and it's only out of some act of mercy from her God that the man in her arms fails to notice ( _chooses to ignore_ ) the way she turns to stone beneath his weight. No. No, no, no – this wasn't supposed to be how this went, this wasn't what she _wanted_. Nikki was going to press the gun to her forehead and press tight against the trigger to erase her from this miserable world so she could suffer justly in the next, and they would fall apart as they'd come together: as friends.

And yet, here they are, the impossible duo of imbeciles, both aggravatingly alive and a confession she has never expected, never _wanted_ to hear being breathed into the wimple around her throat. Just like that, she is an infinite number of miles away from him and pressed flush against the bloodstains on his clothing all at once, and _she - can't - breath._

The blond steals all of the air from around them, spitting it out into words that were never meant to be spoken aloud. “So much. So fucking much. An' you – you don't have to... I mean, it's fine if you don't... Just... Don't _say_ that.” It's fine, he says. It's _fine_ , as though they can press on as if nothing has changed and nothing has been said. Perhaps he genuinely thinks that everything will work like that – but he can only love her for so long before he tires of her, and that is assuming that the Doctor does not tire of _him_ first. She'll tell him no, she doesn't love him like that, that she loves him so much in her own way, but it's not _that_. And then he will leave, out the door, a corpse in the back of his mind, a gun in his hand, a bullet in X's barrel prepared special just for him for when he returns to his boss.

“Nikki,” Mary breathes, untangling herself from iron limbs that soften to cellophane the longer she pulls, “I -”

Eyes meet one another, two frames – one as tall as a sycamore, the other as a rose bush – no more than half an arm's length from one another, and the unexpected look of defeat in his eye threatens to swipe her feet from beneath her trembling frame. Understanding calls to her in the wake of shock: He's thrown away everything to spare her – his work, his idol, his addiction – and she hadn't even the decency to put him down softly. _What a monster_.

But people can change.

Nikki will help her change.

Until then, she'll thank Father again – thank him for teaching her to plaster on a grin and power through the pain. She lies through her teeth: “I think I love you, too.”

 

_04\. thank you, father -_

 

Rain clouds die away, eyes finally beginning to try and claps of violent lightning dissipating as the pitter-patter of precipitation dies down into silence. The sound of the front door slamming shut rings throughout the hall long after it's done ( _long after he leaves_ ), and the curt words that follow their act do just the same in the scape of her mind. All is silent and all is still. Sister Mary is, again, alone.

The air is different now, though – charged where it had been calm, harsh where it had been soft. She is not walking and her fingertips do not roam. She lies there with bear back pressed against the altar, trying so very hard to forget the countless number of times she has been left just like this before, forgotten by her “lover” in favor of something “more pressing”. Something that is not a _thing_ that has been used to its limit. Nikki hadn't even the courtesy to tell her where he was going, or even a simple goodbye, instead having settled for reaching a needle-scarred arm over her trembling form to grab for his crumpled shirt and promising her ( _an empty promise_ ) that he would be back as soon as possible. Out he'd gone, into the final drops of the rain, and here he'd left her, stone still. _Afraid_.

The nun does not mind that he's left. Long ago had she forgotten what it was like to lay with a man and see him stay any longer than it would take to redress, and while some tiny part of her had hoped that maybe Nikki would be different ( _different in every way, in the way he'd tell her he loved her, in the way he'd hold her like porcelain rather the plastic, in the way he would come back for no reason other than that he wanted to be by her side_ ), rationality was quick to remind that no one, not even her closest friend, would make such an exception for her.

What frightens her, shakes her to the core is that it is him, Nikki, who first presses tentative lips against her own, and it is him, Nikki, who exits the church in some unexplained rush, but it's _not_ him in the middle. There is another face entirely that takes the place of the one that should have been there, and even after she has come to accept that he likely won't make good on his word to return, she cannot banish the image from her mind. She can't because it fits so _perfectly_. His touch, his voice, his words – they're all reflections of a dead man. ( _Father William_ _never really die, though. Not so long as she walks this Earth, haunted by his salvation, by his debts that long outlive the kindness that called for them to begin with._ ) He was supposed to be different than all of the rest, but why does it feel so fitting to see the priest in everything he does that night?

Why does it feel like nothing is different at all?

Her head tilts with the lethargy of a terminal patient, turned to face his forgotten pistol no more than a handful of yards away. If he comes back, she muses, it will more likely be for the gun and not the girl he was asked to shoot with it; she half expects it, too, to leap into the air and scuttle out the door, back to its wielder and away from the unlovable. It stays, though, still and silent. Like her. Black and white and cold and hard and _f_ _orgotten_.

“I'm not afraid of dying,” she whispers to it, words spoken like a playground secret.

It doesn't answer.

“It's... sad,” she continues, lifting herself into the air mechanically. The routine is muscle memory by now, and she picks herself up as if the sharpest of movements would shatter her into a million pieces. They would, too, she thinks; she _is_ porcelain, she _has_ been handled like plastic, and she can only be dropped so many times before she explodes with a bang.

There is no active thought in the way she grabs for discarded fabric and drapes it around herself, nor does she realize that she's been shuffling toward her new found conversation partner until the habit is assembled in full, a facade of perfection wrapped around a very imperfect little girl. “Maybe I could have loved him. We would have had enough time.” She bends at the knees daintily to pick it up, the feeling of her palm wrapped around the hilt of the weapon so cumbersome that she reminds herself why she is but a pretty face and not a living weapon. Not that she has ever need to be a fair shot before, and never will she need to be again. “... But where have 'maybe's ever gotten me before?”

Mary isn't afraid of dying – but oh, how horrifying betrayals feel.

 

 _05._ \- _for ruining everything._  

 


	3. swallow every single word ( nikki, doctor x )

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prompt - injured, verse - implied canon
> 
> Nikki learns how it feels to be wanted at the very low cost of his arm.

Red welts from wounds like tears bubble from eyes: thick, wet, and every bit as annoying as it is painful. He'll never admit to the latter being true, though, because real men don't cry at pain, and even if he's still “boy” instead of “young man” or, _heaven forbid_ , his own actual name, if one wants to be treated like one, he'd better start acting like one. Red welts like tears, but he tells himself that red welts like nothing but itself. Battle scars are for warriors, crying for the weak; the blood won't stop flowing from the gouge in his arm, but if he tells himself that it's nothing more than a kitten scratch and the moisture dripping down his face is sweat from the heat of another job well done, he'll be able to meet his idol with at least the tiniest shred of decency. It's a crime enough that he is nothing more than a street rat before a god. If he's going to push his way through those doors splattering crimson in every which way like the walls are his modern-day splatter painting canvas, he might as well do so unbothered.

The man at his feet certainly doesn't look that way, though, all open-mouthed and glassy eyed. There's still an imprint of fingers dipped into the sides of his neck, white against angry scarlet but set to turn blue with the passing of hours. The struggle his killer had gone through to get the job done is evident in bloodied knuckles and a broken nose. The comical expression of shock and disgust is nothing more than mint frosting on a beaten, bloodied cake, and compared to the single streak of pain across the living male's arm, one could have easily mistaken the former-politician as a voluntary punching bag. When the police arrived – and, believe him, it wasn't a matter of “if” but “when” - they'd probably imagine it to be some sort of personal vendetta, what with how violent the act was carried out. The criminal mind had already done his part to clean up any possible traces of DNA on the victim and crime scene around them, though, and there was nothing personal about the act that he'd just carried out. There never is.

Nikki takes the piece of cloth he'd ripped from the stranger's shirt and uses it as a temporary bandage for his gushing arm, flinching as he applies pressure, but definitely not _weeping_ over it.

Doctor X will be none too pleased when he steps into the base of operations with a fresh wound, he knows. Stealth is the game they play, and any sign of a fight means that he has failed to be unseen. Physical conflict could also lead to witnesses, whether just by sound or by sight, and the last time something like this had happened, Mindcrime had been under threat of being discovered. But as sure as he knows his employer will be upset, he knows he will also be forgiving. He learns best through mistakes, and what would have been a fatal slip up gave him the knowledge he needed to clean up the mess he has just made. Every base has been covered, every flat surface scrubbed clean, and it won't be long until the initial error is disregarded in favor of the desired results.

The blond has finished tying the knot on his makeshift bandage when there's a tap at the door. More than one, though – a rapid fire knock that his him bolting upright, the pistol just picked up by his right hand almost clattering to the floor once more. Someone who had heard the commotion, perhaps? An angry neighbor wondering what all of the bumps and crashes had been? Or maybe it was a friend or partner, or maybe even a family member? Whoever the stranger beyond the door is, he or she is of no concern to him. The front door is blocked by his or her presence, but realistically, that would not have been the smartest method of escape. He instead trains his eye on the window he'd slipped in through; from there, all he has to do is slip on his gloves, squeeze out the opening, and close it as if nothing had ever happened.

Less then a five minutes have passed him by before his tattered sneakers have hit the pavement of the streets, window crawled through and wall scaled with as much ease as a clunky man hardly out of high school can muster. Of all those clunky men hardly out of high school, though, he likens himself to be the best – he's been taught well, and even jumping from the height he did produced little noise and little pain. Little pain, at least, compared to the screams of agony that have been erupting from his arm since his decent down the apartment building. He won't let it get the better of him, though, because that is what any other person fitting his profile will do, and if he wants to impress his boss while simultaneously saving the whole city and everyone in it, he's got to be exactly what everyone else thinks he can't be.

This thought pumps enthusiasm through his veins, and before the hit-man knows what's happening, his feet are carrying him in a direction quite opposite of that to his own humble home.

They lead him, instead, to the front door of the operation's base. It's just the sort of place one would expect the Doctor to call his office, as well – humble enough from the outside to be overlooked by the masses, but in a neighborhood not littered with the scum that roam the streets. Whether they be junkies, like his highest hit-man before the boy had found meaning in madness with the revolution, or the rich really depended on his mood. Neither were welcome, unless the former were willing to put down their needles long enough to help push for world-wide reform. This was, sadly, rare. As such, the further from both ends of the spectrum they could place themselves, the better, and the old, well-maintained warehouse was just the perfect spot.

Nikki's knuckles rap against the door to his special rhythm, the word “mindcrime” tumbling from his lips to indicate his arrival and request for entry. He knows from experience that the wait is caused by them visually scanning him over from indoors. Someone could feign his appearance, or they could figure out the duel passwords, but the chances of both occurring were quite slim and what had ultimately kept their base free of anyone who wasn't supposed to be there. The necessity doesn't make the wait any more bearable, though. Impatience comes down to an art with him; even the fifteen seconds it takes for them to solidify that fact this the boy in the trench coat is _Nikki_ and not an imposter feels like it's own small eternity, and he's already kicking up dirty on the pavement when their slide open the door for his entry. “Sorry, boy,” the guard says, bass voice paired with a quiet volume making it hard to hear what's being spoken to him. “Boy,” he'd said. It's always “ _boy_ ”. Someday he'd be more than just a child to these men – they may have a decade's lead on him at least, but he will prove to them all that he can do more than any _boy_ can. “Didn't expect to see you around so late. Shouldn't you be headed home?”

The hit-man brushes past him without so much as a word, but the motion draws attention to the white-turned-red cloth tied around his forearm. He flinches at the arm that shoots out and catches him by the shoulder. Turns to glare into eyes filled with a mixture of confusion, anger, and, worst of all, disappointment. “You didn't have that when you left earlier.” It's not a question. There is no “oh, has that been there all morning?” running through the older male's mind. His words ring of accusation, and the only question hanging in the air is: Did you mess up again? Something about that lights an angry fire in the pit of his stomach. It's one thing to be judged by Doctor X – fair, perfect Doctor X who has the right to judge every piece of filth the world has to offer – but to be stared down by the entry way's _guard_ of all people is not something he will stand for.

He wretches his shoulder away and turns completely away, blue eyes focused on the wood flooring of the hallway stretched out before him. “Is the Doctor in?” he asks, not even deigning to provide the earlier remark with a response. Puffs of annoyance follow after a moment's hesitation, and a whole ten seconds pass in white noise before he gets his answer.

“He's not gonna be happy, seeing you like that.”

“Whatever. He'll get over it.”

The snide comeback earned him an inhale of disbelief – you'd think they'd learn with time – but he's already on his way to the aforementioned “he” before a proper response can be given by his guard “friend”. Everyone is shocked by his outward rudeness toward what the Doctor says, does, and stands for, but both he and his boss know that the words are far from genuine. He is the most loyal of pawns, and anything crude that tumbles out of his mouth about the operation is for shock factor only. And maybe he likes it better when they _don't_ learn; the way they fumble like fish on land when he casually insults or mocks everything they all put on a pedestal goes beyond hilarious. Just thinking about that _stupid noise_ from just moments earlier has the tiniest of smirks playing with his face when he pushes open the double doors of the whole warehouse's most important room. He wipes it off immediately, though, in the presence of his idol. Such childish expressions will not be held in the presence of a man truly fit to be called a man.

Perhaps it's the way he swings the doors open so fast, so hard that they hit against the walls that signals _his_ entry, and no one else's; maybe it's the weight of his footsteps as he moves closer inside; maybe it's the smell of smoke on his breath or his clothes; maybe his employer can boast eyes in more places than his down-turned head. Whatever the reason is doesn't really matter in the end, though. What matters is that his presence is known before the demagogue even looks up to see his face. “I'm surprised you're back, Nikki,” X begins, adjusting the glasses on the bridge of his nose as he continues reading through an article on his desk. There are more like it stacked around his desk, each one folded neatly and more organized than he, himself, could ever achieve. Just how many different newspapers are lined up to read this late in the night? “Did you not complete tonight's mission?”

“He's dead,” Nikki says. The hand attached to his uninjured arm plays with his ruined bandage as if a silent cry for attention. If there's to be talk of his careless injury, he doesn't want to be the one to have to bring it up. “There was... a little bump, but he's dead.”

A sigh falls from the Doctor's lips, but he still doesn't look up. “You were caught in the act, then. He didn't struggle too much, I hope?”

“Uh.”

There's a missed beat in there, less then a second's worth of absolute _nothingness_. No sound, no movement, no thoughts tumbling through his head. And then it happens. Slowly, agonizingly so, reading glasses are removed, folded, and set precariously next to the abandoned paper and chocolate eyes move to fix their gaze on ripped sleeves and bloodied material. The blond sucks in his breath, holding it as the other male stares in passive silence as if he were waiting for it to jump out at him. By the time something changes, he's running out of breath; it's with a single eyebrow raised that brown locks on blue and the question about to be asked rings in the air before it's even spoken. “That doesn't look pleasant. This didn't hinder your ability to slip away unnoticed, did it?”

Too quickly does he answer, “No!”

Curious eyes calculate him as his idol leans back in his chair. By now, the second eyebrow has raised to meet its mirror closer to his hairline and the silence dictates he continues. A cough. Then words. “I-I mean, no, sir. He fought and made a scene, but no one saw. I cleaned up the whole place, too; no DNA traces, no _nothin_ '.” He swallows the rock that has lodged itself in his throat and explains, “I came here to make sure you knew that. Didn't want you to find out from someone who had their facts wrong.”

X regards him in silence, expression not quite as wondering as before, but still anything but gentle. The hit-man can't possibly fathom what goes on inside the educated mind behind Operation: Mindcrime – he was never very good at reading people, but even if he had been, he figures the man would still be a complete enigma to him – and the fact that the clock on the wall has ticked as many times as it has between words begins to have doubt bubbling inside him. Is he not forgiven? He'd cleaned the crime scene, but maybe he was still in trouble for having to clean up the scene in the first place. He's about to open his mouth once more to question this, in fact, when the silence is broken by the sound of the chair creaking into place The Doctor has leaned forward again, and at last, muddy hues fall back to their default expression. No anger, no disappointment. He is in the clear.

“Very well, then. Thank you for coming to me first.” The blue-eyed male nods then, joy bubbling in his core at a bullet well dodged. He wasn't sure what he was going to do should his boss grow upset with him; the idea of “mindcrime” being whispered to him and his jobs being carried out against his will was a result he both feared and had come to accept as likely punishment. If he had failed to clean up after himself, that was probably what would have waited for him. Fears are shoved away, though, in the back of his head where they cannot bother him. It's all for the good of mankind in the end, after all, and he's no reason to cower while still in the audience of the Doctor. The last words to fall between them sound like closing remarks, and taking them as such, he moves in preparation to leave – stops only when more words are being tossed his way. “Oh, and... make sure you have that injury inspected before you retire for the night.”

He furrows his brow. He doesn't mean to, but it happens. Does the chess master have so little faith in his pawn? “I've had worse,” he says, although that's not quite true. This is easily on tier with some of his more painful wounds. Doubt, however, in his abilities is not something he wants from his employer. “It won't get in the way of any of my missions.”

“Who said it was the missions I was concerned about?”

Nikki freezes then. Freezes in his spot, turned slightly away from the desk parallel to the door and stares at the indifferent face of the mysterious Doctor X. He is not smart, but one does not have to be an honor role student to understand the implications of those sentences. If it is not the missions he is concerned about, it is the one carrying them out, and while something about that has him dumbfounded for more time than he'd like to admit to, something else about that has the slightest traces of a smile pulling at his lips. He cares. The Doctor cares. _Someone cares_.

“That is all,” he concludes, reapplying his reading glasses and nodding toward the door in a silent request that he leave. “Do have a pleasant evening, Nikki.”

Not a second is wasted. He is out of the room, door slammed behind him and mind racing to the prestissimo beat of his heart.

He had not been prepared for that.

He loses himself in the maze that is the inside of the base of operations, feet guiding him on a path he's only half aware exists while he mind occupies itself on his memories. The turn into the operation's personal doctor's office is almost missed in such a daze, and even as the man in white pokes and prods at the gash on his upper arm, all he can focus on is this _feeling_. This feeling of being wanted, _needed_ for the cause. Of someone caring for his well being.

Nikki is sent home with a proper bandage on his arm – no stitches required – and, as he curls into the imagined warmth of a white block devoid of anything but a bed, a chair, and his thoughts, he whispers out into the night:

“G'night, Doctor.”

 


End file.
